If you're on the side of the oppressor, or you're defending the oppressor, or you're actually trying to humanize the oppressor, then that's a problem.
Linda Sarsour
I hope that we when we stand up to those who oppress our communities that Allah accepts from us that as a form of jihad.
Dissent is the highest form of patriotism, and I intend to continue to push my country to respect the rights of all its citizens. I will not be silenced.
I'm going to make mistakes. I'm going to say things I may not understand have hurtful impact on people. I always call people to call me in, to educate me. And to love me enough and to see my contributions in a way that, when I become better, our country becomes better.
Dan Donovan was the district attorney at one point who could not indict NYPD officer Daniel Pantaleo, who choked Eric Garner on video, for the whole country to watch, for the whole world to watch. And he actually, immediately after that, won a seat in Congress. He beat a Democrat to get into Congress.
I will not walk away from the people and communities whom I love deeply. I will continue to raise my voice for justice and equality for all, organize communities who want to defend the rights of black people, stand against policies that target and marginalize Muslims, and advocate for health care for all people.
We show up to fight racism, anti-black racism, xenophobia, homophobia, transphobia, Islamophobia, misogyny, patriarchy, anti-Semitism, because after Donald Trump is out of office, there will still be all those things here.
Our obligation is to our young people, is to our women, to make sure our women are protected in our community.
I didn't wake up one morning and become some important person.
Reading a teleprompter is not what makes you presidential. It's your actions that you take, and it's democracy.
Alleviating suffering of the most marginalized communities must begin with assessing the needs of entire communities and allowing the most marginalized to lead the strategy. My belief is those closest to the pain are closest to the solution.
I've been working with Jews for over 20 years.
I'm Muslim. I'm Palestinian. I'm a woman in a hijab.
Time and time again, organizers have proved that when we work together, when we organize together, that we can win.
I wholeheartedly believe that we can't organize just as women. There has to be specific messaging and an issue prioritization based on identity groups. Because when you ask a black woman what her top priority issues are versus a white woman versus a Muslim woman versus an undocumented woman, you're going to get... different answers.
Look, yes, I'm a Muslim woman and I want to bring my community to the table, but I also want to make sure that I'm not being tokenized.
Jared Kushner is the last person that should be trying to bring peace to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
Slavery was legal. Japanese interment was legal in this country. Segregation was legal.
Our number one and top priority is to protect and defend our community. It is not to assimilate and please any other people and authority.
You have to understand when you're organizing with women of color, you can't use words like 'marginalized' and 'second-class citizen' loosely.
What's wrong is wrong, and that's absolutely acceptable, and I understand that people get hurt by things that people say that are hurtful, and we should be able to say that when someone says something that hurts us, that it hurts us.
If you woke up this morning and you are breathing, and you are Muslim, then you are political. You have no choice but to be political in a country that has politicized you and politicized your religion.
There are no perfect leaders.
I believe in a nonviolent movement of boycott, divestment, sanctions.
I care about affordable housing. I care about bus routes. I care about small business. I care about schools. These are not Muslim issues. Even protection of civil rights - that's not just a Muslim issue. That is for everyone.
I'm a Palestinian-Muslim, but I'm also a progressive.
The way you raise the profile of an issue is by making the issue cool and relevant in pop culture.
You can't be a feminist in the United States and stand up for the rights of the American woman and then say that you don't want to stand up for the rights of Palestinian women in Palestine. It's all connected.
We have to, as a progressive movement, organize climate justice and reproductive rights and racial justice. We've got to do this. We can't continue to organize in silos.
Minister Farrakhan absolutely says anti-Semitic, misogynistic and homophobic remarks. And we have unequivocally rejected all forms of racism and hate, including anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, homophobia, transphobia, etc.
We must stand together united in solidarity against the targeting, demonization, and vilification of any group of people.
My work has always been rooted in nonviolence, as espoused by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
When you talk about feminism, you're talking about the rights of all women and their families to live in dignity, peace, and security. It's about giving women access to health care and other basic rights.
I'm not going to hide my positions to make anyone else feel comfortable.
We will protect our constitutional right to boycott, divest, and sanctions in this country.
As one of the national organizers of the Women's March back in 2017, immediately after the Women's March, over 20,000 women across the country had registered to run for office - the largest numbers we've seen in probably our entire American history for women to run in this way.
There are plenty of Muslim women who are backbones of the community, but they aren't usually at the forefront. There just aren't a lot of me out there - women in hijabs, doing what I do.
I think the Women's March is actually reflective of this idea that you can create a big tent, but that doesn't mean the people inside of the tent are going to agree on everything. In fact, they might have very public fights about the things that they don't agree with.
I wish that more of the celebrities, who are multi-millionaires, probably, are able to say to themselves, 'Wow, my communities are under attack, and I need to give back to my community.'
I began my work as director of the Arab American Association of New York in the wake of the horrific attacks of 9/11.
It just doesn't make any sense for someone to say, 'Is there room for people who support the state of Israel and do not criticize it in the movement?' There can't be in feminism. You either stand up for the rights of all women, including Palestinians, or none. There's just no way around it.
You've probably seen that any visible Palestinian-American woman who is at the forefront of any social-justice movement is an immediate target of the right wing and right-wing Zionists. They will go to any extreme to criminalize us and to engage in alternative facts, to sew together a narrative that does not exist.
Being a Muslim American activist, I've been targeted by the right wing in a way that is very dangerous.
I haven't given up on my country. I believe in the potential. I believe in the Constitution.
I believe that this is the land of religious freedom and that that applies to Muslims. And if I have to make it apply to Muslims with the work that I do, I'm going to do that.
It's not enough just to elect people of color and women of color and progressives. We need to make sure that they have a work plan and that they are - continue to align with the communities that helped get them to where they're at.
When I stand up here, and I'm fighting for your rights and the rights of all people in these United States of America, I am a true patriot.
The Palestinian people were governing themselves before the creation of the State of Israel.
The progressive Left is sometimes very uncomfortable for staunch pro-Israel supporters, but what's very clear to me is that the progressive Left does not make Jews feel unsafe.
I'm the national co-chair for the Women's March on Washington.
